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Thursday, December 01, 2011

Rape - It Still Isn't Funny

Fueled by anger over an 11 year old girl who was gang raped and blamed for the crimes, and the culture of rape jokes, I wrote a blog post in March titled, Rape is Not Funny.

I'm reminded of this post when I look at my analytics. Every week there are searches for "rape is not funny" and "rape is no joke" that bring people to that post. But more frequent are the other searches that bring people there, searches like: "funny rape" and "rape jokes" and "rape is funny" and "funny rape jokes" and "rape pictures" and "funny rape story" and "funny rape pictures".

Yes. People are searching for those things (and worse) every day.
(feel free to throw up after reading those searches, I feel sick every time I see them)

"Here is why I refuse to take rape jokes sitting down…Because 6% of college-aged men, slightly over 1 in 20, will admit to raping someone in anonymous surveys, as long as the word “rape” isn’t used in the description of the act—and that’s the conservative estimate. Other sources double that number (pdf).

A lot of people accuse feminists of thinking that all men are rapists. That’s not true. But do you know who think all men are rapists?

Rapists do.

They really do. In psychological study, the profiling, the studies, it comes out again and again.

Virtually all rapists genuinely believe that all men rape, and other men just keep it hushed up better. And more, these people who really are rapists are constantly reaffirmed in their belief about the rest of mankind being rapists like them by things like rape jokes, that dismiss and normalize the idea of rape."

Rape jokes hurt survivors. Rape jokes lead rapists to believe that you are okay with it, that maybe you do it too, and that you think it is fine, normal, and even funny.

Rape is no joke, and it certainly isn't funny.

*Note on the links contained in the quote: The first link is broken, it seems the article was removed from the College News website. After a little research, I found Meet the Predators, which gives a great overview of the 2002 report Repeat Rape and Multiple Offending Among Undetected Rapists by David Lesak and Paul M. Miller, which is the source of the 6% statistic. It also contains information from the 2009 report, Reports of Rape Reperpetration by Newly Enlisted Male Navy Personnel by Stephanie K. McWhorter, et al.

Wow. That excerpt was mind blowing. Truly. I've never thought of it that way before, but it makes such crystal clear sense. Yes, there are certain things that should never, ever be made fun of, or taken lightly or laughed about and rape is most certainly one of the top ones. Two words, "Rapists do" are the main reason for that.

it sounds to assume the world as you are is a coping mechanism but still, wicked how many fund it funny or dismissable. humour is a way to deal with the difficult. for example, we joke about death as a way to control it.